Though unhealthy eating and marijuana use are health-risk behaviors, they are inherently different. Research has indicated that eating behaviors in children are shaped by observing the eating behaviors and food preferences of their parents , while marijuana use is modeled more by one’s peers . Parents may exhibit greater motivation to discuss unhealthy eating as this behavior has an impact on their child’s direct survival from infancy to adulthood. The discussion tool of marijuana use may be missing important elements that motivate a protective response in parents. A revised tool may be needed to promote discussions about more controversial topics such as marijuana use. Such a tool is needed particularly given that recent changes in legalization and availability of marijuana use in the United States may lead to parents viewing marijuana use by youth as less risky or troubling, leading to fewer discussions of the behavior with their child. These trends are in line with recent declines in perceived risks of marijuana use among youth . The study further tested the moderating effects of parenting styles on tool conditions and perceived effectiveness, perceived interpretability, motivations to address the behavior, self efficacy, coherence, intentions, willingness, tool download, discussion behavior, tool use, and willingness to pay for the tool relative to the control condition . With the inclusion of the authoritative parenting-framed message in the unhealthy eating and marijuana use discussion tools, vertical weed grow it was predicted that parenting styles would moderate the relationships between tool effects and the dependent measures.
In particular, it was predicted that the improvement relative to the control condition would be greater for low authoritative parents than for high authoritative parents, greater for high authoritarian parents than for low authoritarian parents, and greater for high permissive parents than for low permissive parents. This is because it is believed that authoritarian and permissive parents will benefit more from authoritative tools compared to authoritative parents, as they are in the greatest need for assistance. The effects of the discussion tools on perceived interpretability, motivations to address the behavior, marijuana use discussion intentions, and willingness to pay for the tool were moderated by authoritative parenting styles. In fact, for parents with high authoritative parenting styles, the marijuana use discussion tool led to lower perceived interpretability and lower motivations to address the behavior. Whereas, for parents with low authoritative parenting styles, the marijuana use discussion tool led to higher marijuana use discussion intentions and higher willingness to pay for the tool relative to the sedentary behavior tool. In line with hypotheses, the findings on dependent measures show that the marijuana use discussion tool had greater effects for low authoritative parents compared to high authoritative parents. This extends research on the positive effects of authoritative parenting in encouraging parent communication about health related behaviors leading to better health outcomes for children as the tools were authoritatively-framed. The effects of the discussion tools on motivations to address the behavior, self efficacy of unhealthy eating discussions, coherence of unhealthy eating discussions, and self-efficacy of marijuana use discussions were moderated by authoritarian parenting styles.
In fact, for parents with high authoritarian styles, the marijuana use discussion tool led to higher coherence of unhealthy eating discussions and higher self-efficacy of marijuana use discussions relative to the sedentary behavior tool. Whereas, for parents with low authoritarian styles, the marijuana use discussion tool led to lower motivations to address the behavior, lower self efficacy of unhealthy eating discussions, lower coherence of unhealthy eating discussions, and lower self-efficacy of marijuana use discussions relative to the sedentary behavior tool. In line with hypotheses, the findings on dependent measures show that the marijuana use discussion tool had greater effects for high authoritarian parents compared to low authoritarian parents. These findings provide support for the efficacy of authoritative parenting-framed messages in motivating parental discussions of risky behaviors in parents with high authoritarian parenting styles.The effects of the discussion tools on perceived effectiveness, motivations to address the behavior, self-efficacy of unhealthy eating discussions, coherence of unhealthy eating discussions, unhealthy eating discussion intentions, coherence of marijuana use discussions, and sedentary behavior discussion intentions were moderated by permissive parenting styles. In fact, for parents with high permissive styles, the unhealthy eating discussion tool led to higher coherence of unhealthy eating discussions, lower unhealthy eating discussion intentions, and higher coherence of marijuana use discussions relative to the sedentary behavior tool. Whereas, for parents with low permissive styles, the unhealthy eating discussion tool led to higher perceived effectiveness, higher motivations to address the behavior, lower self-efficacy of unhealthy eating discussions, higher unhealthy eating discussion intentions, and higher sedentary behavior discussion intentions relative to the sedentary behavior tool. In line with hypotheses, the findings on coherence of unhealthy eating and marijuana use show that the unhealthy eating discussion tool had greater effects for high permissive parents compared to low permissive parents.
Contrary to hypotheses, the effects of the unhealthy eating discussion tool on unhealthy eating discussion intentions showed negative effects for high permissive parents, and negative effects for perceived effectiveness, motivations to address the behavior, intentions of unhealthy eating and sedentary behavior for low permissive parents. Overall, the findings for the moderation analyses mostly supported hypotheses by suggesting that low authoritative parents, high authoritarian parents, and high permissive parents find the tools more useful. For authoritative parents and authoritarian parents, the marijuana use discussion tool was more effective in motivating discussions compared to the unhealthy eating discussion tool for permissive parents. Specifically, for low authoritative parents the marijuana use discussion tool led to increased levels of perceived interpretability and motivations to address the behavior, and for high authoritarian parents the marijuana use discussion tool led to an increase in coherence of unhealthy eating discussions and self-efficacy of marijuana use discussions. For permissive parents the unhealthy eating discussion tool led to higher coherence of unhealthy eating and marijuana use. An interesting discovery is that authoritative and authoritarian parenting served as moderators for marijuana use conditions, whereas permissive parenting served as a moderator for the unhealthy eating conditions. It could be that authoritative and authoritarian parents are more likely to have marijuana use discussions because they feel more confident compared with permissive parents. Whereas, permissive parents identify better with unhealthy eating because it is an easier topic to discuss as compared with marijuana use. According to Baumrind Classification of parenting styles authoritative and authoritarian parents tend to be higher in discipline and structure, and expectation compared to permissive parents that have lower discipline and structure, and expectation. In fact, authoritarian parents are known for establishing strict rules which could be more common for marijuana use, while permissive parents allow for freedom of choice which could be more common for children when picking which foods to eat . This knowledge should be applied to revise the discussion tools that were developed for parents to have discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use with their children. A priority should be on the development of the discussion tools based on the behavior by taking into account aspects of the parenting styles and how they might affect the specific discussions. Being exploratory in nature, this study has several important study implications. First, the difference in unhealthy eating and marijuana use offers opportunity to refine and validate the discussion tools in future studies for these behaviors. These differences can be assessed by taking into account the behavior and framing the messages with not only parenting styles but behavior as well. For instance, rolling benches for growing implementing tools for unhealthy eating that utilizes friendlier language compared with more structure for marijuana use. Second, we generated two new discussion tools that were effective in motivating discussions. These discussion tools can be applied to other risky behaviors and possibly distributed to parents in different settings in order to test the adaptability and acceptability of each tool with larger parent populations. Future studies could look to examine these dynamics more clearly in a larger sample of parents of children ages 10 to 17 years old. It is important to note that there were several moderating relationships of various dependent measures that were not significant. Since these discussions tools are newly developed, more research is needed to explore the moderating effects of parenting styles in motivating discussion behaviors of unhealthy eating and marijuana use.
Additional studies could add more dimensions of authoritative parenting styles in the discussion tool , instead of just including a script. Strengths of the present study include its focus on a largely unexplored area of parent motivations to discuss unhealthy eating and marijuana use, its contributions to further development of discussion tools utilizing authoritative parenting-framed message, and the use of a longitudinal design, in a sample of parents in the United States. This study added partial evidence of the moderating effects of parenting styles in some of the relationships between unhealthy eating and marijuana use discussion tools and the PWM factors. A second strength of the study is that it could be replicated, and tested, with other conditions in order to test the moderating impact of authoritatively-framed discussion tools on more behaviors. Though, if replicated alterative strategies should be implemented for motivating parents to have these discussions by revising the tools or testing with a no-treatment control condition. A third strength is that the study provided valuable information on whether these newly developed discussion tools would be effective in promoting discussion behaviors in a sample of parents. These tools could possibly be disseminated to school settings in order to further test their effectiveness in motivating discussions of unhealthy eating and marijuana use. Lastly, these findings provided important data on the differences in discussion behaviors for unhealthy eating and marijuana use, in which the unhealthy eating discussion tool was more likely to motivate discussion behavior. Limitations of this study require consideration when interpreting the results and point to directions for future research. Initially, the results may not be representative of all parents across the nation or in other countries, as it consisted predominantly of NonHispanic White and well-educated participants. Although, MTurk has become a popular method used for recruiting large heterogeneous samples such as parents of adolescents from across the nation and has been demonstrated in several published psychological studies . Second, the findings may not be generalizable to all parents, particularly as we focused on parents of children ages 10 to 17 years old. More research is needed to determine if results would vary for different ages , ethnicities, number of children, gender of parent, and if the results would extend to other behaviors as well. There is a definite need to extend the study to test for differences in mothers and fathers and to assess if their possibly differing parenting styles could influence discussion motivations of unhealthy eating and marijuana use with their children. This could provide vital information on whether the discussion tools could be more generalizable to a more representative population of parents and children across the United States.The parent-child relationship has a major influence on child development and behavior. Parents can play a critical role in preventing their children from engaging in behaviors that could harm their health and well-being. Identifying whether or not discussion tools of unhealthy eating and marijuana use are effective for parent and child conversations centered on risky health behaviors is of particular importance. Another component to consider in promoting parent-child discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use is the associations of parenting styles. In particular, the present research project examined parenting styles in three ways. Initially, guided by an adapted PWM framework the study tested the associations of parenting styles, attachment styles, parent child communication; specific risks and prototypes of unhealthy eating and marijuana use by one’s child; levels of self-efficacy, coherence, worry; discussion intentions and willingness on parental past discussions of unhealthy eating and marijuana use . Second, it revealed the authoritative parenting-framed message on talking with one’s parent about unhealthy eating and marijuana use was perceived by young adults as most effective in motivating discussions about these behaviors . Finally, it provided partial support of the moderating effects of parenting styles on discussion tools and cognitive factors . The findings supported most of the hypothesized relationships delineated by an adapted PWM framework , suggesting the potential utility of the parenting styles and cognitive factors in promoting discussions about unhealthy eating and marijuana use.